The Many Faces of Roleplaying: How ‘RPG’ Became Everything and Nothing

[Autumnal]

But so does 'video game' which can mean anything from Pac Man to Call of Duty to Baldur's Gate 3. Or 'book' which can mean anything from the Bible to Dan Brown to Tolkien to A Brief History of Time.

And “book” can also mean something copied by hand by a scribe, a Folio Society tome, a zine, and ebook, an audiobook….

I honestly wonder sometimes how gamers ever manage to communicate.

Objection! Presumes facts not in evidence! Often we don’t!

Wittgenstein argued in his Philosophical Investigations that there is no single feature shared universally by all games, but rather that all games share what might be called 'resemblances'. For much of the long history of language, 'game' has enjoyed and participated in various degrees of vagueness.

"Role-playing" also participates in vagueness; it seems to follow naturally from the fact that two nebulous terms, "role-playing" and "game", taken together, are not going to admit of convenient or simple understanding - this admission does not of course preclude "RPG" from being used however the term is perceived to best serve marketing, or for that matter, any other interest(s).

Always happy to see Wittgenstein come up in these things. The point strikes me as something that should be self-evident.

 

[Maxperson]

While I appreciate the OP, and anyone who makes the attempt to present an argument in the form of an essay ...

I certainly hope that there are stylistic indicators for "Snarfness" that are more than just "amount of verbiage."

I mean ... How is Snarf like Tolstoy?

...no one bothers to read either.

And you're more likely to write Warring Peas.

 

[dragoner]

I struggle with writing, my supplements and adventures are mostly maps, and random encounter tables; like here is the starship, the crew, the starport, a dive, some NPC's, and adventure leads.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I struggle with writing, my supplements and adventures are mostly maps, and random encounter tables; like here is the starship, the crew, the starport, a dive, some NPC's, and adventure leads.

I mean, that's the core of what you need for hard utility. Don't sell yourself short!

 

[Maxperson]

I think that’s a fair read, and I’d agree the conflict rarely shows up at the table. Most people don’t argue about definitions mid-session; they just play. The tension I’m describing isn’t about players clashing—it’s about how habits and expectations shape what people believe the game is before they even sit down.

For me most tension I feel before sitting down at a game isn't really a part of the term roleplaying game. For me it's about style of play. Is it more Hack 'N Slash, or is it focused on intrigue. What house rules or optional rules are in play.

Sometimes I do have an expectation about what a game is when it's new to me. I've never played Deadlands, but if I signed up for a game at a convention I'd expect some Old West feel to it. My expectations wouldn't be very detailed, because I'd only have a vague idea of what the game is about.

The above only applies to TTRPGs and LARPs, not video RPGs. Why? Because I've never considered any video game to be an RPG. The very first time I heard a video game referred to as an RPG, I responded to the guy that it wasn't an RPG, but just a video game. The thing with video games and board games, is that they are limited. The only difference between a D&D video game and some random video game is that with the D&D video game, the options I get to pick from and the goal I'm working towards are D&D themed. An RPG to me isn't limited in choice like that.

If I'm in an D&D video game and I walk into a room, it may only give me the option to search the walls, the desk and the bookshelf. I won't get the option to search the table or floor. In an RPG, I can tell the DM that I'm searching the floor for trapdoors without needing the option to be given to me. I can also take out my Decanter of Endless Water and cover the floor with it to see if any water seeps through the stonework. If the DM tells me that there is a portion of the floor where the water is seeping through lines in the floor outlining a large square, I probably found the trapdoor without even a roll.

Computer games, even ones as detailed as Baldur's Gate 3, just don't have that unlimited aspect to them. They're a lot of fun to play, but they just aren't RPGs to me. The same goes for board games like Gloomhaven.

 

[dragoner]

I mean, that's the core of what you need for hard utility. Don't sell yourself short!

Though if you are reading it to read it, I probably don't have enough story.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Though if you are reading it to read it, I probably don't have enough story.

I'm not saying lore and story aren't appreciated (they very much are), but the mechanics are IMO far and away what most RPG supplements are going to be used for in terms of reference. That's hard and valuable work and shouldn't be discounted.

 

[dragoner]

I'm not saying lore and story aren't appreciated (they very much are), but the mechanics are IMO far and away what most RPG supplements are going to be used for in terms of reference. That's hard and valuable work and shouldn't be discounted.

I find deep lore to be somewhat unrealistic, even today people can't agree on recent history, much less what happened a thousand years ago.